Beautiful Urbanism
Gender, Landscape, and Contestation in Latino Chicago's Age of Urban Renewal
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4155713 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Mike Amezcua (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2017 |
| Volume | 104 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 97-119 |
| Publication date | 2017-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of American History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-8723 • E-ISSN: 1945-2314 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jahist/jax006 |
| OpenAlex | W2667351631 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
On a warm September day in 1953, elegantly dressed couples walked over dust and debris on their way to a dance in the Ashland Auditorium in Chicago. The beautifully ornate three-story structure, supporting a grand clock tower built during the first wave of the Chicago school architecture movement of the 1880s, now stood amid the rubble and dust produced by the nearby wrecking balls sent to clear the streets for new redevelopment projects in the Near West Side neighborhood. In contrast to the gloomy atmosphere surrounding the building, the inside of this decorative ballroom pulsated with jubilant dancing and music, as Latino groups celebrated las Fiestas Patrias, commemorating Mexican Independence Day. That evening, local bands performed, and the party culminated with the crowning of a beauty queen. Pageants, dances, and social celebrations helped Latinos repurpose buildings such as the Ashland Auditorium that prior waves of ethnic Europeans in the Near West Side had abandoned. The dilapidated buildings of the neighborhood, which the city now targeted for the construction of new civic areas and expressways, became critical spaces for Latinos to forge community bonds and beautify their neighborhood.1
Aesthetics · Archaeology · Art · Ballroom · Beauty · Dance · Independence (probability theory · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Urbanism · Visual arts · Architecture · History · Latin American and Latino Studies · Law · Race, History, and American Society
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,33 |
| Citation span | 2023 - 2023 (1) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |